Defense

ARELLANO UNIVERSITY
Jose Abad Santos Campus

Basic Education Department – Senior High School
3058 Taft Avenue, Pasay City
EFFECTS OF PSEUDOSCIENCE ON COVID-19 RELATED INFORMATIONS TO THE
STUDENTS OF GRADE 12 HUMSS AT ARELLANO UNIVERSITY JOSE ABAD
SANTOS CAMPUS
Galon, Felicity Grace G. Asuncion, Dave C. Salvador, James Cedric T.
Gerana, Tristan Niel Cruz, Franz Dylan G. Santos, Ashanty Shane V.
Manalang, Cassandra Louisse L. Espi, Rhea Mae Toñada, Rochelle O.
Ovilla, Dhana Marie B. Flores, Adonis

EFFECTS OF PSEUDOSCIENCE ON COVID-19 RELATED INFORMATIONS TO THE STUDENTS OF GRADE 12
HUMSS AT ARELLANO UNIVERSITY JOSE ABAD SANTOS CAMPUS
INTRODUCTION
Background of the study
Pseudoscience has been an issue for a long time, and researchers have found a common misconception that people have regarding
trusting science for the credibility of information. According to a journal article by Albarracin D., Palmer R., and O’Brien T.,
entitled "Misplaced Trust: When Trust in Science Fosters a Belief in Pseudoscience and the Benefits of Critical Evaluation,",
science is indeed the best way to combat fake news as it is based on facts. However, according to the survey in an article entitled
"Science Disinformation: On the Problem of Fake News" by Gerbina, T.V. (2021), "the journal's study of 7,000 scientists revealed
that 33% of them acknowledged breaking scientific ethics. The forces behind pseudoscience are ingrained in the current system of
scientific publishing, which was created to disseminate trustworthy knowledge. In this system, a combination of scientific
advancements and monetary rewards for scientists and publishers stimulates the production and promotion of false results. Fake
science information is a result of false scientific data." This statement concludes and proves that there is information that uses
pseudoscientific explanations, which leads to the creation of false information that could affect the credibility of science and the
knowledge that the readers of the said news can obtain.
INTRODUCTION
Also, in the first article, it is said that pseudoscience has been used for different COVID-19 information, such as cures and
mitigations; some are used for political purposes. During the time of the pandemic, it is dangerous to see this pseudoscientific
information as it makes some individuals' perspectives change with wrong beliefs, especially those who can’t critically analyze
information. Another danger here is when an individual who believes in pseudoscientific claims starts to oppose real information
because they already believe in pseudoscientific information.
Pseudoscience has been a long-standing problem, and it has been an issue for a long time to mislead someone. In predicting
the future outcome of this issue, an article entitled "Let’s nab fake science news: Predicting scientists’ support for interventions
using the influence of presumed media" says that this issue might affect the credibility and trust in science. At the same time,
COVID-19 has also been an issue known to all, and so there is incorrect information, yet it is claimed to be true by many due to
the misuse of scientific explanations incorporated into it, hence, pseudoscience. Some popular examples of it are regarding its
possible treatments or remedies and how it spread.
INTRODUCTION
This study aims to determine the effects of pseudoscience on the timely health-related issue of COVID-19 among the
grade 12 Humanities and Social Sciences at Arellano University's Jose Abad Santos Campus by conducting a survey
questionnaire. This is done to determine the extent of the potential effects of fake news on students and to use this study as a
tool for raising awareness of the issue. This would be important for the students to know about this issue that is circulating so
that they could avoid its possible effects, which will be found out in this study.
Statement of the problem

This study aims to determine the effects of pseudoscience on the students in Grade 12 Humanities and Social Sciences student at
Arellano University-Jose Abad Santos Campus. Specifically, it sought to answer the following questions:
1. What is the Demographic profile of the respondents in terms of:
1.1Age
2. Section
2. What would be the effects of pseudoscience on the information regarding in COVID-19 given to the respondents
3. Were scientific explanations help to build credibility and reliability in an information
Hypothesis
H1: There is a significant effect of pseudoscience on the student of Humanities and Social Sciences.
H1: There is a significant effect of having scientific explanations to build reliability to an information.
Significance of the study
This study focuses on students to help them be aware of pseudoscience about COVID-19 and be able to distinguish it
from the truth. Additionally, this will also help us to understand how pseudoscience affects the students in Grade 12
Humanities and Social Sciences at Arellano University’s Jose Abad Campus. The significance of pseudoscience awareness is
also discussed in this study.
This study is conducted to benefit the following:
Students – The result will help the students with information about the effects and negative outcomes of pseudoscientific
information about COVID-19. At the end of this study, students would finally know how to differentiate information that is
true or not. This research would benefit not only the students in Grade 12 Humanities and Social Sciences at Arellano
University—Jose Abad Campus but also students in other schools and strands who may come across this problem.
Significance of the study
Teachers – The given data would guide the teachers to have a deeper understanding of pseudoscience which will help them be
mindful of it. They can also raise awareness about it among their students in the future.
Future researchers. The outcome of this research will help future researchers with its existing information and may be able to
be one of the references in conducting their new research related to this study. This study would be beneficial to them in terms of
validating the theory that they would use and finding the data they needed, which comes from the results gathered in this
research.
Scope and delimitation
This study will focus only on discovering the effects of pseudoscientific information about COVID-19 on students of Grade 12
Humanities and Social Sciences at Arellano University—Jose Abad Campus enrolled in the academic year 2022–2023. Any other
aspects of this issue, like how it is done, who the people behind it are, and their reasons for doing so, are not included in this study.
There will be no age, gender, or any other demographic profile restrictions for this study as long as you are enrolled as a grade 12
Humanities and Social Sciences student at the said university and campus within the year 2022-2023. The researchers will only
focus on 32 respondents in grade 12 Humanities and Social Sciences students ranging from sections 1 to 8 (4 students per section)
Any other strands and campuses aside from the said target participants are not included in the data gathering in this
study, However, even if they are not participants in the study, they will benefit from it.
Theoretical framework
This study was supported by Information Manipulation Theory by Steven A. McCornack (1982). According to Information
Manipulation Theory (IMT), people "manipulate" pertinent information in a variety of ways inside their speech while lying to
others. According to IMT, "the particular ways in which people manipulate information are aligned with the conversational
maxims suggested by philosopher Paul Grice.". The four "maxims" in which people deliberately break one of these to manipulate
the information are quantity, quality, relation, and manner. For this study, it will focus on two of these maxims: "quality" and
"quantity." In the first "quality", it is stated "it refers to the assumption that what is said in a truthful conversation is true; we
assume that our sender is saying something accurate." In this study, those who have used some information or news with
pseudoscientific explanations break the "quality" of maxims by giving misused scientific explanations so that it will look legit,
and the readers will believe that this information was accurate, and theoretically, it could be the worst maxim as it provides a
supporting idea so that the false information will look accurate. Secondly, in terms of "quantity," it says that "we give the right
amount of information to communicate clearly and accurately." "We give just enough detail so that they can understand us, but not
so much." Within this problem, the second maxim, which is "quantity," is broken by just adding enough misused scientific
explanation to information to make it balanced and still believable to the readers.
Theoretical framework
For the validity of the statement above, an article entitled “Information Manipulation and cognitive trust: an organizational
Replication and Extension of IMT” by Howard H., Griffin D., Arth Z., (2021). Says that their findings suggest that violations of
the maxim of quality are perceived as least honest. This study is done by creating different scenarios in which they violate one of
the four maxims to other people to test its deceptiveness. In connection to the study, quality, one of the four maxims said to be the
least honest among the four, has been violated in this issue. This article doesn’t say or explain the relationships between the four
maxims and this study, but it supports the idea that quality (one of the maxims violated in this issue) is the most deceptive one and
needs to be stopped.
Conceptual framework
INPUT PROCESS
OUTPUT
 The Demographic • A survey
 Expose the effects of pseudoscientific
profile of the conducted through google. form to a student explanations to the student of
of target participants Humanities and Social Sciences
respondents
students.
Statistical treatment of the gathered data
o Age
 Gives conclusions regarding on the
o section results of survey.
• Analyze the data. which are collected
 What would be the effects of
through survey
pseudoscience on the
information regarding in
COVID-19 given to the
• Gives conclusion. to the results of
respondents
survey
 Were scientific explanations help
to build credibility and reliability
in information
Definition of terms
The advantage for clarification is what the limited significance terms used in this study and these following terms are:
Pseudoscience – A belief or explanation that people mistakenly think is correct because of scientific methods.
Media literacy – It is the ability to analyze and interpret different messages in a different context.
Deceptive – It is the action taken to make false information look valid and acceptable to others.
Adequate interpretation – Sufficient understanding and analysis of a text.
Maxim – A short pithy statement expressing a general truth or rule of conduct.
Disseminate – To spread out or give out.

Justifications – An act or thoughts to explain a claim.
METHODOLOGY
Research Design
The researcher used the descriptive method of research, which is a fact-finding method with adequate interpretation. It is
concerned with the condition of the individual relationship that are existing, the process, and the effects that are occurring. The
researcher used a Google form survey as a tool to gather first-hand information to support the study of the effects of
pseudoscience on information regarding COVID-19 on the students of Grade 12 Humanities and Social Sciences student at
Arellano University-Jose Abad Santos Campus. This is done to determine the extent of the potential effects of the said problem
on students and to use this study as a tool for raising awareness of the issue.
METHODOLOGY
Research Instrument
To get the accurate data needed, the researcher will have a survey questionnaire. Part 1 will ask for respondents’ profiles, such as
their name, sex, age, grade level, and strand. Part II will be an assessment to determine whether they encounter COVID-19
information with pseudoscientific explanations and if they believe it. To create the survey, the researchers used three statements
from different sites and articles; some of the statements contain pseudoscientific explanations. The statements used came from:
Thomas, S. (2021). Garlic extract allicin: a possible inhalation therapy for COVID-19? The pharmaceutical journal.
Suwangool, P. (2021). Key Things to Know About COVID-19 Vaccines.
Elsebai, M., Albalawi, M. (2022). Essential Oils and COVID-19. National Library of Medicine.
METHODOLOGY
Data Gathering Procedures
To gather all the necessary data needed in this study, the researchers will choose the participants within the target population
using the convenient random technique, and those 4 participants from sections of Humanities and Social Sciences 1 to 8 with a
total of 32 students will answer a survey questionnaire that contains all the questions needed to identify the variables of this
study. After answering the survey, the researchers will analyze the answers given by the participants, interpret all the gathered
data, and, with all the data that they have, they will formulate the conclusion to this study.
Albarracin D., Palmer R., O’Brien T., (2021)., Misplaced trust: When trust in science fosters a belief in pseudoscience and the
benefits of critical evaluation.
Retrieve from: (https://www.asc.upenn.edu/sites/default/files/2021-08/misplaced%20trust.pdf)
Gerbina, T.V., (2022). Science disinformation: On the problem of fake news. Scientific and technical information processing. DOI:
10.3103/S0147688221040092.
Retrieve from: (https://link.springer.com/article/10.3103/S0147688221040092)
Ho S., Goh T., Leung Y., (2022). Let us nab fake science news: Predicting scientists’ support for interventions using the influence
of presumed media influence model.
Retrieve from: (https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/1464884920937488)

McCornak., S., (1992). Information manipulation theory.
Howard H., Griffin D., and Arth Z., (2021). Information manipulation and cognitive trust: an organizational replication and extension of IMT. Atlanti
Journal of Communication. DOI 10.1080/15456870.2021.1884078.
Retrieve from: (https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/15456870.2021.1884078)
Thomas, S. (2021). Garlic extract allicin: a possible inhalation therapy for COVID-19? The pharmaceutical journal.
Retrieved from:
https://pharmaceutical-journal.com/article/letters/garlic-extract-allicin-a-possible-inhalation-therapy-for-covid-19
Suwangool, P. (2021). Key Things to Know About COVID-19 Vaccines.
Retrieved from:
https://www.bangkokhospital.com/en/content/know-well-before-getting-the-covid-19-vaccine
Elsebai, M., Albalawi, M. (2022). Essential Oils and COVID-19. National Library of Medicine.
Retrieved from:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9696513/#:~:text=Eucalyptus%20Oil,and%20Cannabis%20sativa%20%5B21%5D.

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ARELLANO UNIVERSITY

Jose Abad Santos Campus

EFFECTS OF PSEUDOSCIENCE ON COVID-19 RELATED INFORMATIONS TO THE

STUDENTS OF GRADE 12 HUMSS AT ARELLANO UNIVERSITY JOSE ABAD

Galon, Felicity Grace G. Asuncion, Dave C. Salvador, James Cedric T.

Gerana, Tristan Niel Cruz, Franz Dylan G. Santos, Ashanty Shane V.

Manalang, Cassandra Louisse L. Espi, Rhea Mae Toñada, Rochelle O.

Ovilla, Dhana Marie B. Flores, Adonis

Statement of the problem

1. What is the Demographic profile of the respondents in terms of:

3. Were scientific explanations help to build credibility and reliability in an information

Significance of the study

also discussed in this study.

This study is conducted to benefit the following:

Significance of the study

Scope and delimitation

Adequate interpretation – Sufficient understanding and analysis of a text.

Maxim – A short pithy statement expressing a general truth or rule of conduct.

Disseminate – To spread out or give out.

Suwangool, P. (2021). Key Things to Know About COVID-19 Vaccines.

benefits of critical evaluation.

Retrieve from: (https://www.asc.upenn.edu/sites/default/files/2021-08/misplaced%20trust.pdf)

Retrieve from: (https://link.springer.com/article/10.3103/S0147688221040092)

of presumed media influence model.

Retrieve from: (https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/1464884920937488)

Retrieve from: (https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/15456870.2021.1884078)

Suwangool, P. (2021). Key Things to Know About COVID-19 Vaccines.

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